So, I had all emeralds collected. I beat E.G.G. Station without getting hit, collecting all 36 rings along the way. I played through the ending, collecting all 21 rings along the way. At the end of the cutscene...

He transformed into Super Sonic and displayed the Super Sonic ending pose. So I can confirm that that one, at least, is used, although I'm not sure of the exact requirements of getting it to show.

So, I had all emeralds collected. I beat E.G.G. Station without getting hit, collecting all 36 rings along the way. I played through the ending, collecting all 21 rings along the way. At the end of the cutscene...

He transformed into Super Sonic and displayed the Super Sonic ending pose. So I can confirm that that one, at least, is used, although I'm not sure of the exact requirements of getting it to show.

I wonder if he just needs to collect all 21 rings during the ending to use the Super Sonic pose? When I did it I missed a few but I should have already had 190 rings at that point.

I've tried a few times now, but that second to last line of rings always catches me by surprise. Even if I know it's there, I always jump too soon, or hit them just late enough that I miss the last set. I'm kinda getting tired of fighting the Egg Mech over and over. It's bed time.

You know, I bet the other normal Sonic pose is achieved when you collect all of them without having collected the Chaos Emeralds.

So, I had all emeralds collected. I beat E.G.G. Station without getting hit, collecting all 36 rings along the way. I played through the ending, collecting all 21 rings along the way. At the end of the cutscene...

He transformed into Super Sonic and displayed the Super Sonic ending pose. So I can confirm that that one, at least, is used, although I'm not sure of the exact requirements of getting it to show.

I really tried last night, honestly. I've got the iPod version, and I just can't seem to make the final boss without getting hit. I can do all of the other bosses fine though.

I was right to assume about the Super Sonic thing, and I'm guessing the other pose is when you do collect all the rings without the Chaos Emeralds. That's a nice little surprise for players. Ashame it was found so early on by hacking.

And since everything was pretty much publically revealed, I'm going to copy and paste the thread I opened in the Tech Members lounge back in June, when the hacking endeavour started.

QUOTE (Endri @ Jun 24 2010, 04:46 AM)

It is true that this community always pursue for the most inimaginable things. It has been like this since the first Sonic 2 prototype have been discovered by Simon Wai, back in 1998. Such discovery unleashed a new wave of possibilities, and made us become one of the communities with the most technical prowers. It is also true that, after many years of research, we have been able to fully understand the inverse-enginery of the classic Sonic games. After many years as well, we have been able to get ahold of many Sonic games prototypes... except this time, we have been able to acquire the beta version of a Sonic game prior to the game's actual release.

A new age has been born.

This the result of my exploitantions: (I appologise beforehand for the crappy, low resolution, off screem, pictures)

Upon an extensive research, I've been able to figure out how the game data is stored, and how the game access such data. The game is now pratically wide open, and, just like we saw happenning with it's predecessors, Sonic 4 will too be hacked.

I would say a Hex Editor as well, but since we are in the Techmembers Loundge, I assume you already have one readly available, so I'll ignore this step.

As you may have noticed, the game comes packed in a container file, which is a format that is used for most Xbox 360 apllications.

First, extract the game's content using wxPirs.

Now, open QuickBMS and select the CPK script. We will use this script to unpack the data.cpk file. The CPK format is a default CRI Middleware container. Technically, it could be pretty much extracted with CRI Tools, however, this Sonic 4 data.cpk has it's label variables wrong, so CRI Tools can't extract it. It can be fixed in a Hex Editor though so the extraction can be done using CRI Tools, but I'll not disclosure this right now.

After the proccess, we will end up with the raw game files. The folders are conveniently organized as zones and/or what they represent, so this make our job easier.

As you can see, the most important data is stored in these AMB files. Thanks to PolygonJim's notes, I was able to understand the format, and I was then able to write a fully functional app that is able to extract the files for modification, and rebuild them afterwards for insertion in the game. And this hacking utility happens to be the AMB Tools. This is a little low down on how to use it. There are two options: you can either unpack an existing file or you can repack a previously unpacked file. I didn't go further and add a builder because the game uses many references inside the files, so building a package from scratch wouldn't have much use. Upon Unpacking an AMB file, a new folder will be created in the same directory of the AMB file in question, with all the extracted content. The program will output a XML file. This XML file is what holds the original AMB file references, so you can repack the new content, and the game will accept it. To repack, you will be prompted to select a XML file that contains AMB file references. To repack, replace the old content with the new one, making sure they have the same file names. If for some reason the program don't find the files with the same names, it will warn you, so don't worry. The new repacked AMB file will be outputted in the same folder of the XML file.

CRI Tools will be used to repack the data folder back into data.cpk. You don't need to change any parameters. Just go with the default values, and the game will recognize the content.

And now, Sonic 4 - Level Editor. This is still very early, it's in alpha stage, but I plan to someday make it a fully featured hacking utility. To use it, you'll need to first extract the content of the ZONE##_MAP.AMB of your preference. Currently, it can only load and show and edit the rings layout data. The Ring layout information is contained in the .RG file. Upon extensive research, I've been able to figure out the rings, objects, decorations and level layouts data. Unfortunately, the level mappings are done using 3d models. The model format is similar (or the same) to the one used in Sonic Unleashed PS360. Link knows the format pretty well, since he was able to convert the Sonic Unleashed PS360 models to be used on GMod. If I could learn from him how the format works, will be able to make a editor that is able to grab all the data on the fly, so it will be able to create a exact presentation of how things will appear in game, since most of the data (objects, enemies) are 3d models. To use the program, load a Ring Layout file. It will be able to display the ring data as it appears in the game. Just click on a ring and drag it to change it's position, click once on the empty canvas to add a new one, or double-click a ring to delete it. Pretty straightforward. After making the desired changes, save it, then repack it using AMB Tools, replace the new ZONE#_MAP.AMB with the old one, repack everything with CRI Tools, and test the changes!

To run the game, just place the raw files on a USB storage device, or whatever you use to use data on your J-TAGged 360, and open the game's default.xex with XeXLoader or XeXMenu. By running the game as .xex, it runs as trial, but apparently there is a way to unlock it, even though I haven't tested it yet, which happen to be by using xm360. If everything else fails, you can just rebuild the entire container using wxPirs again.

Also, I would like to ask of you people to keep this information private, until the actual release of the game, since we can't afford to make them changes all the formats all over again just because they have been cracked, and making all these unslept nights worthless.

Some informations might be incorrect, since these researches were done with the Partner Net build and the E3 build, but I'll revised them later, but since I'm in a hurry right now, I'll leave this as it is and edit later, alright.